In the next screen choose an Empty project template and don't enable any of the checkboxes, leave them all unselected

Either use the NuGet Package explorer to install Umbraco 8 or the Package manager console (the command is: Install-Package UmbracoCms)

Use CTRL+F5 to run the project and start the Umbraco installer

The screenshots below are for Visual Studio 2017, but you should follow a similar journey for 2019.

New solution

To install Umbraco we first need a Visual Studio solution.

Note: Check that your Visual Studio version is at least 15.9.6 (Help > About Microsoft Visual Studio), lower versions do not install the correct NuGet dependencies.

Visual Studio 2017

Go to File > New Project and pick an ASP.NET Web Application.

Note: Double check that in the "Framework" dropdown you've selected .NET Framework 4.7.2, Umbraco will not work with lower versions than 4.7.2. Similarly, refrain from naming your solution Umbraco, as this will cause a namespace conflict with the CMS itself.

On the next step, select the Empty template. It's important to pick empty as other templates include incompatible versions of MVC and Json.NET. (Don't enable any of the checkboxes to add folders or core references. Umbraco will add them for you).

Finding and installing the Umbraco package

The latest release of Umbraco is always available in the NuGet gallery. All you have to do is search for it and install.

To install Umbraco from the Visual Studio interface, right-click on the new project you've made and choose Manage NuGet Packages.

You can then use the search function to find the package called UmbracoCMS. You'll also find the Umbraco CMS Core Binaries package and the Umbraco CMS Web package, they will be included automatically when you choose Umbraco CMS. So make sure to pick Umbraco CMS (highlighted in the image below) and click the Install icon (arrow down).

NuGet will then download dependencies and will install all of Umbraco's files in your new solution.

Package manager console

You can do the exact same thing from the package manager console, which is a bit quicker as you don't have to click through the menus and search.

Then type Install-Package UmbracoCms to start installing the latest version of Umbraco.

Running the site

You can now run the site like you would normally in Visual Studio (using F5 or the Debug button).

Follow the installation wizard and after a few steps and choices you should get a message saying the installation was a success.

Post installation

Note that the Umbraco NuGet package adds a build step to always include the Umbraco folders when you deploy using Web One-Click Publish with Visual Studio. You can see these folders in packages/UmbracoCms x.y.z/build/UmbracoCms.targets.

Should you need to exclude any of these folders or content, you can add a target to your .pubxml files in the properties/Publish folder. For instance if you need to exclude json data a plugin generates during production.

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